Students demonstrate against Nike practices
By Daily Bruin Staff
March 4, 2001 9:00 p.m.
 LILY JAMALI UCLA students Gillian Russom
and Behzad Raghian make signs in front of Niketown
in Beverly Hills in preparation for Saturday’s protest.
By Lily Jamali
Daily Bruin Contributor
Students from Southern California universities assembled at
Niketown in Beverly Hills on Saturday to protest the
corporation’s alleged sweatshop abuses at a factory in Mexico
and elsewhere.
About 40 students from UCLA; California State University, Los
Angeles; UC Santa Barbara; Pitzer College and San Diego State
University participated in the protest, one of several organized
across the country as part of a national “day of
action.” Similar protests took place in San Francisco, New
York City and at various Nike stores across the country.
UCLA students attended from the International Socialist
Organization and United Students Against Sweatshops, a nationwide
organization with 200 member campuses working to end sweatshop
conditions in the garment industry.
“I’m here in solidarity with the workers down in
Mexico who are trying to unionize,” said Behzad Raghian, a
third-year political science student.
“They are demanding better wages and working conditions,
and I think that all human beings deserve those things,”
Raghian said, referring to workers at the Kukdong factory in
Puebla, Mexico, which produces clothing for Nike.
Managers at the factory have recently come under fire from
sweatshop watchdog groups for dismissing five workers who were
organizing a union. In January, about 800 workers walked out in
support of the five workers who lost their jobs, prompting managers
to fire hundreds more.
 LILY JAMALI Behzad Raghian, a third-year
political science student, and other students protest against Nike
in Beverly Hills on Saturday. Although Nike managers stood in front
of the store for both hours of the protest, they declined to
comment about Nike’s position on allegations of labor
abuses.
But Nike Inc. representative Veda Manager said that 692 workers
have been rehired at the Kukdong factory, and the International
Labor
Association has initiated freedom of association, which makes it
easier for workers to organize.
“Things are normalizing and stabilizing at the
factory,” Manager said.
According to protester Karl Swinehart, a teacher in South
Central Los Angeles, sweatshops affect members of the L.A.
community, although people often view them as a uniquely foreign
phenomenon.
“A lot of my students’ families are immigrants from
El Salvador and Mexico,” Swinehart said. “About a third
of my students’ parents work in the garment
industry.”
“I had one mother come in for a parent conference, and her
finger was all torn up because she was working on an unsafe
machine,” Swinehart continued. “She has no medical
health coverage, and this is a woman who has been working at this
factory for 10 years. That’s outrageous.”
According to Swinehart, immigration policies often intimidate
workers into staying silent about the working conditions in the
garment industry in the U.S.
“Every worker in this country should have a decent living
wage and shouldn’t feel that they have the threat of
deportation if they stand up and speak out about the abuses that
they face,” Swinehart said.
Swinehart and other members of the International Socialist
Organization distributed newspapers and explained the purpose of
the action to people passing by on foot and in cars. A handful of
drivers stopped in front of the store to see what was going on.
Although protesters were peaceful, the Beverly Hills Police
Department provided security at the event.
“The reason we are here is two-fold,” said Don
Prenesti of the BHPD. “One reason is to help the protesters
out, and the other is to make sure that the rights of the store are
also protected.”
“We are just here as middlemen to facilitate the
process,” Officer Prenesti added.
In recent months, Nike has received bad publicity from
publications like the Los Angeles Times, among others. On Sunday,
the Times ran a story on Jonah Peretti, a graduate student at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology who wanted to personalize a
pair of Nike shoes with the term “Sweatshop.”
The company refused to embroider the word on his shoes, claiming
that his order made use of “inappropriate slang.” Since
being refused, Peretti’s e-mail correspondence with the
company has been forwarded to people all over the globe.
Despite such publicity, some bystanders at the protest said
though conditions may not be ideal, things could be worse.
“Look at it from the flip side,” said onlooker Jake
Johnson. “Look at what Nike does for the people in these
countries. It has probably brought employment opportunities that
they might not otherwise have.”
Manager also said Nike has raised the age requirement to 18
years in footwear factories and 16 years in apparel factories.
“We have also changed to water-based glues and we have
consistently raised wages in Indonesia and other places based on
university research,” Manager said.
Still, many protesters said, although Nike has brought jobs to
other countries, working conditions must change.
“Our voice is making changes, even though Nike and
companies like it won’t admit it,” said John Simonian,
who graduated from Loyola Marymount University two years ago and
now works on social justice issues.
“The only reason that they have made any changes at all is
because of pressure from consumers,” Simonian added.
“For me, it’s a small price to pay to take two hours
out of my Saturday to come out here.”
